It’s not just climate change adaptation — why perspectives need to be sought, not waited for.
What can researchers do to accelerate the transition toward a sustainable future? Last Friday I attended the webinar “Tempohöjning i klimatomställningen — förväntningar på forskningen”, organised by the government research council for sustainable development (FORMAS). In this blog post I will reflect on the main insights from the webinar, as they relate to intergenerational justice and the role of youth in climate adaptation.
As its title suggests, the webinar revolved around the role of researchers in accelerating the adaptation to climate change. Invited to speak were, among others, Swedish climate scientists, journalists, politicians and NGO-representatives. The two hours seemed to simply fly by, filled to the brim with interesting discussion.
One of the core messages of the webinar was the importance of including different perspectives, both in research and in decision making processes. The youth movement has from the beginning urged politicians and decision makers to “listen to the science”. During this webinar it was also one of the main concerns raised by the researchers, as they discussed how to best communicate research findings to politicians and other actors in society, in order to bring about long-lasting change. A related question was how scientists should be involved in political debates. Some of the panellists suggested that researchers should provide a foundation for politicians to base their decisions on, rather than to actively participate in public debate. Jacob Dalunde (member of the European Parliament, representing the Swedish Green Party), however, argued that the way to influence politicians is through shifting public opinion. If politicians are to act in accordance with scientific findings, the actions need to have support among their voters.
I joined the event with the specific interest to gather inputs and learn more about what this group of experts sees to be the positioning of youth and children on this important and very pressing challenge — climate change adaptation. Although children and youth, as a social group, were not explicitly brought up during this part of the discussion, I think that Dalunde’s point raises concerns for the possibility of children and youth to have an influence on their future; the very fact that they are not eligible to vote makes their needs and concerns less likely to influence the agendas of political parties today.
Yet, those who are very young today will be those to bear the impact of political decisions. How do we reconcile with this? The very fact that such considerations are usually not part of policy debate is interesting, and worth to be further reflected upon. I think this highlights several things. One, it speaks about power relationships in society and that despite Sweden being a progressive country, there are still some social groups who just keep falling behind. Second, this also speaks of the importance of finding other ways to include the voice of children and youth in decision making processes that affect their future.
Another significant reminder was brought up by Kristina Östman (Head of climate at the Swedish society for nature conservation), when answering a question on youth involvement. Looking at Greta and the movement she’s inspired, Kristina said it’s easy to think of children and youth as actively caring about climate justice, and sustainability, but that this is far from reality. Children and youth need to be seen as a diverse group of people, with different needs and interests. To me this brings about the question: if sustainable development requires many perspectives to be heard, how do we ensure a diversity of young voices be heard as well — and not only the voices of Greta and other activists?
Listening to this talk I would say that researchers, whether choosing to participate in public debate, or communicating findings directly to politicians and change makers, could also contribute by incorporating the perspectives of children and youth, and other marginalised groups. If including different perspectives is essential to long-lasting adaptation, then these perspectives must be actively sought. This is relevant not least when it comes to urban governance and the shaping of the environments today’s youth will live and grow old in. There are ethical questions to be kept in sight but opening up and making space for less represented voices, with novel methodologies in research and planning, is a great way to go forward.
